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jhernik writes "The ongoing debate over the supposed dangers posed by mobile phone usage and wireless signals has exploded once again. An influential European committee has called for a ban on mobile phones and Wi-Fi networks in schools – the GSM Association has denounced the report as an 'unbalanced political assessment, not a scientific report.' The report made its recommendation to reduce mobile and wireless use in schools, despite admitting that there is a lack of clear scientific and clinical proof. However, it said the lack of proof was reason enough to restrict use, just in case, comparing mobile phone radiation to other things whose dangers were once unknown, such as asbestos, leaded petrol and tobacco."

So we have politicians making a political point with "data", and an industry lobby making a political point with "data", and nobody unconnected to the politics and the money doing any analysis on the other parties "data".

How about someone comes up with something scientifically significant without proving to be in bed with one side or the other?

How about someone comes up with something scientifically significant without proving to be in bed with one side or the other?

Maybe because no one outside of the "beds" is concerned about this issue? If you get a research firm or university to study this matter they will be biased by the existence of, or lack of, wireless in their facility.

How about someone comes up with something scientifically significant without proving to be in bed with one side or the other?

Maybe because no one outside of the "beds" is concerned about this issue? If you get a research firm or university to study this matter they will be biased by the existence of, or lack of, wireless in their facility.

There's one thing I haven't seen anyone mention. The omission of it in this discussion is amusing.

Banning wireless phones and other devices won't halt exposure to the radiation. If your cell phone has reception, you are already being exposed to radiation from the cell towers. Turning off your phone or not bringing it to the building won't change that. Not only is this ban not supported by any scientific study, it wouldn't even accomplish its stated purpose even if all studies were unanimously in support

I think the idea is that the transmissions from the devices are the target. I had someone seriously tell me I should take my phone out of my posket when I can so to avoid cancer risk from 8 hour a day exposure of the same body area.

I had someone seriously tell me I should take my phone out of my posket when I can so to avoid cancer risk from 8 hour a day exposure of the same body area.

Exactly - if you have a transmitter then the intensity of radiation you are exposed to is considerably higher than just receiving since it falls off as 1/(distance squared). However this should mean that any cancers are far more likely close to transmitters so presumably it should be easy to see: cancers would be near your pocket or near your ear.

However basic common sense can tell you that this report is ridiculous. If cell phones are wireless devices are really, or even probably, causing cancer then w

more importantly, everyone knows there is no effect to be found, which means that the only reason anyone would look is if they want to find something or want to reassure people that theres nothing there.

Cell phone radiation, being modulated on GHz frequencies, is too high in frequency to mess with brain signals and too low in energy per photon to mess with molecules.

Cell phone radiation, being modulated on GHz frequencies, is too high in frequency to mess with brain signals

Sometimes the frequencies have to get even higher to get into the brain. Radiation from the display runs in the 400 to 800 THz band [wikipedia.org], but think of the effect that the phone's display has on its user's concentration.

Cell phones are safety devices; you can call for help if, say, someone shoots up your school, or you sibling goes missing, or your child goes missing, or endless other permutations. It also saves resources; because I could text my brother, I could find out he's got a meeting at school for a couple hours he forgot to tell me about and not call on a manhunt because the incompetent school staff can't find him.

As for plugging in, my former high school used mobile computer labs to save on costs; now they didn't

Monash University Shooting. There are places on this planet that are heavily armed and have low crime, and heavily armed and high crime. Australia is more heavily armed than Pakistan, for instance, but I know where I'd feel safer. Iraq and Finland have very close gun ownership rates.

To nitpick: a "school shooting", to me, means it occurs at a primary or high school, where kids are being educated and teachers have a responsibility over those kids. A university is populated by adults and there's not really that same teacher-student responsibility. Universities are also generally more open in terms of who can just walk in and out of them.

But I agree with your post - gun ownership rates do not correlate particularly well with the prevalence of violent crime.

Australia removed all automatic and semi automatic guns from the public years ago, so I simply do not believe this claim. We have a very low rate of gun crime compared to the US. I have never seen a private citizen with a gun on the streets and am very happy that is the case. The Monash shooting occoured before guns were removed. There has not been a simlar incdent since.

Semi-automatic firearms (esp. pistols) are easy enough to obtain in Aus. - it's just a matter of who you know. I've declined the opportunity to buy one for myself (more likely to be severe legal trouble for me than have even the opportunity to do net good with it, I'd still have to go to the same kind of people to buy ammo, couldn't practice on a range, etc.)

We have lower firearm-related crime rates for a lot of reasons. Better public education, better welfare systems, and a rehabilitation-focused justice

The private school my friend works at has three to five per room (and no class has as many as 30 students). You wanna map out the channel/interference pattern for their buildings I'm sure you're welcome to try.

This is the cause of the push for 5GHz Wi-Fi - more non-overlapping channels and less interference between rooms due to the more rapid signal attenuation.

Yeah. There's an emergency and a relative is dying. Those few minutes between the school getting the call and the kid actually being able to get to the phone to respond to the call could mean the difference between the relative seeing the kid before he/she dies.

Screw you, stop thinking of yourself and "the rules."

And of course, everyone before 1997 had their lives ruined by the absence of instant notification of every significant event in their lives... sigh.

Seriously, what aspect of the issue should be subjected to scientific scrutiny?

I think it's solely a political question, as in: are pupils to be *available* for telephone messages while in class or at school?

I think there is a good reason to say that they aren't. Certainly not while in class, and for that reason jamming cellphones in classrooms strikes me as totally reasonable. Whether cellphones should be jammed in the hallways or on the grounds is another matter though.

Yep. Turn off your lights and stop staring at your computer screen. Don't go outside. Radiation is radiation. It's not like there's any difference between alpha, beta, gamma, microwave, and visible. Kind of like the no difference between liquid nitrogen and gaseous nitrogen. Both completely lethal/safe if inhaled.

Which is why we should ban sunlight within a school zone, right?Turns out, different portions of the electromagnetic spectrum have different effects, and are classified as such (Thermal, ionizing, etc). Saying radiation is dangerous without first analyzing power levels and the band of radiation emitted is knee-jerk and anti-science. We've had to deal with a nuclear fusion reactor above our heads for the whole of human existence, and it didn't kill us yet.

i think u should head back and do some chem 101 and physics: electromagnetism. Radiation is radiation, if its at a low frequency for a long period of time you will have molecular activity, specifically what is called molecular jitter or vibration.

If you're exposed to a higher frequency for a shorter period of time, you'll just get activity sooner.

That's quite wrong actually. You will get very different types of activity depending on the frequency, because the frequency determines the energy per photon, and a molecule can only absorb a photon of electromagnetic radiation if its energy corresponds to the energy gap between two quantum states.

For microwaves you're talking about the rotational states of things like water molecules, and for infra-red, the vibrational states of covalent bonds. What we feel as temperature. Over time, the temperature can rise to the point where a chemical change will occur, but those changes absolutely will not occur unless the irradiated area actually gets hot. The human body is also really good at spreading and dissipating excess heat.

Higher frequency radiation can to act on the electrons in molecules directly, starting with visible light which can interact with electrons in the large orbitals of highly conjugated long-chain molecules and bring about conformational changes (this is how your eyes work). Ultra-violet light can break a covalent bond directly, damaging tissue and DNA or creating free radicals which then go on to do this damage. X-rays and gamma rays can blow an electron right out of an atom, creating interesting and exotic ions which could wreak all kinds of havoc in the body.

The first category of electromagnetic radiation, which includes wi-fi and mobile phones, is only dangerous if it is intense enough do deliver energy to your body faster than you can dissipate it. For example, if you're standing near a large fire. The latter type can trigger a cancer with a single "lucky" photon, which is why you should always wear a hat and sunscreen to minimise that chance.

I really wish people would understand this. Radiation is Radiation.

No. It's not. Really. This is true even without getting into the differences between electromagnetic radiation, particle-based radiation (alpha and beta rays), and radioactive material -- all of which are referred to as "radiation" in the popular media.

I think the problem here is that your definition of "lucky" is on the scale of all atoms on earth spontaneously decaying. Hey, did you know oxygen atoms decay, producing exactly the same kind of radiation found at Fukishima? Maybe to avoid getting "lucky" you should avoid oxygen.

"You're not really proving me wrong here"um, yea he kind of owned you, ps celphones are not particle emitters, there is no physical bit of matter leaving your antenna, think of it as being shot in the face with an airzooka, vs being shot in the face with a bullet

C = lambda times nu...big deal, it's what I said without explaining how it works. You still haven't told me how an adverse effect is inversely proportional to a longer lambda. see I can use big words too. but still...explain if you want.

The thing is that there is a threshold. It's not just a direct proportionality. Photons with energy below the threshold of breaking chemical bonds aren't "a little bit dangerous" they're just not (individually) dangerous at all. Enough of them to cause heating can be dangerous, hence not standing near open furnaces nor putting oneself in the microwave, but at low intensity they just will not have the same effect on chemical substances that high frequency photons will have, no matter how long the exposure.

and if your standing near a particle emiter - such as a cell phone

A cell phone is not a particle emitter (in the sense of a particle being a thing with mass, not something with a localized wave-function). In general, high-velocity particles with mass (alpha and beta radiation) are much more dangerous than the photons you encounter in your daily life because they have vastly more energy.

if one lucky photon can on the off chance give you "cancer" what's the likely hood that prolonged exposure to radiation at a similiar frequency won't get you "lucky" again. really?

Similar frequency, sure. The longer you're exposed to UV radiation the higher the chance of something bad (e.g. melanoma) happening. However, if the photons are below the threshold of causing chemical change, as those from radio transmitters are, the length of exposure doesn't matter at all. None of the photons have enough energy to do anything significant.

If qualifications are important, I have a degree in physics and physical chemistry, but I got it a few years ago so I'll apologize in advance if the facts I "crammed" in there have faded a little.

A high school football player just last week died during practice. MANY kids are hurt doing team sports in schools. There's a KNOWN, DEFINITE health threat, proven beyond a shadow of a doubt!

If they can ban stuff based on the vague possibility of a problem, why not ban what is PROVEN to be one!

No, we need to BAN EVERYTHING!It's the only way to be sure.

The trouble is if you ban bans, then you can't then ban anything else.

So you must ban everything, then ban bans.

If anything new comes up, you then refuse to acknowledge it exists. Shutting your eyes and covering your ears while yelling lalala at the top of your lungs is very helpful there....except that at that point, it's been banned.

The ban on breathing also places an upper limit to the effectiveness of the strategy, and the reign of any regime adopting it. For more information see Origin of Species (also

I know that in Canada, high school football is quite rare. Mostly stick to basketball, volleyball, and track. Some wrestling. Football and hockey are quite dangerous in terms of head injuries, and schools tend to shy away from these sports. You can still play these sports outside of school settings, but very few schools that I know of have teams. I had a gym teacher in highschool who told us they used to have football but dropped it because of insurance costs. I can't believe high schools in the US ha

Yeah I live in a smallish city and the 3 public highschools, and catholic highschool have a football team. Sadly though my graduating year year was the last for wrestling, one of the few sports I really enjoyed. I hated everything else.

A high school football player just last week died during practice. MANY kids are hurt doing team sports in schools. There's a KNOWN, DEFINITE health threat, proven beyond a shadow of a doubt!

If they can ban stuff based on the vague possibility of a problem, why not ban what is PROVEN to be one!

It's as simple as fear of the unknown, a basic feature of human nature. Why do people fear plane crashes and terrorist attacks and mostly ignore far greater risks to health and life like car crashes and hear disease?

It's as simple as fear of the unknown, a basic feature of human nature. Why do people fear plane crashes and terrorist attacks and mostly ignore far greater risks to health and life like car crashes and hear disease?

Step ladders. If there is one thing you should fear, it is step ladders.

But sports have a know, quantifiable benefit to the students that participate. Overall children are healthier because of them. Cellphones on the other hand, have little if any benefit to children. Their affect on their lives is detrimental in almost every respect. Do they give them cancer? That's still up for debate. But does it really matter? The only thing your child should be taking into a school are books and pencils. Everything else is a distraction.

TFA: However, it said the lack of proof was reason enough to restrict use, just in case, comparing mobile phone raditation to other things whose dangers were once sunknown, such as asbestos, leaded petrol and tobacco."

It would seem they want to hold off using anything until somebody proves the negative....

Except the "dangers" of cell phone radiation aren't unknown. Acording to the largest, longest, and most methodologically sound study on the matter, there is no elevated risk of cancer due to cell phone radiation.

Except the "dangers" of cell phone radiation aren't unknown. Acording to the largest, longest, and most methodologically sound study on the matter, there is no elevated risk of cancer due to cell phone radiation.

People need to understand this kind of shit is not based on science, on logic, but on people being irrational.

Here's a great example:

I work for the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at a university. This means faculty here have electrical engineering PhDs, they've take classes on radio waves, understand how they work. These are not uneducated people, and they are educated in a relevant area.

So a few years ago we got building wide WiFi. I mean complete, 100% coverage. Like 300-400 access points

Instead of having to explain to students that excessive cell phone use, such as texting, during class is a large distraction to the educational process they would rather have the easier option of frightening them into submission with tales of "you'll get testicular cancer of the face!".

Or maybe they're right and we're all going to die of WiFi poisoning during class.

It seems like they could address problems like texting with a "technical fix" though, e.g. special cell/wifi access points that only allow calls to 911 or registered parent phone numbers, etc. That way they'd avoid all the political problems (parents would probably even be in favor of it).

OTOH, then they'd have to spend some money (and would probably end up being cheated by shady vendors)...

Does anyone really, really, I MEAN REALLY, understand how this EM crap works? I mean, just a few years ago, they discovered that effect, whatever they call it, friedsnell or something, where the stuff bounces back and hits other stuff. I think. And now they want to shoot RADIATION at us? BAN IT!!! What's next? Chernobyls on every street corner? Will someone PLEASE think of the children????

In the early 1990's I had the opportunity to work on a project developing calibrated, sensitive microwave thermocouple sensors to study the intensity of microwave radiation inside 'human head models generated by cellphones'. It is of possible interest that the work was funded by a major cellphone manufacturer, however, the source of the funding did not influence the integrity of the work. I also spent considerable time comprehending (at least, giving it a good try!) the mountain of literature of the epid

Electromagnetic waves can interfere constructively, in fact it's rare a given volume of space the dimensions of the wavelength has a single photon of that length in it. Any "safe limits" are very nominal, you could have harm occuring with much lower intensity EM.

A woman who is 4.5 months pregnant is traveling east.Another woman who is 4.5 months pregnant is traveling west.When they meet, the local "intensity" of babies is momentarily doubled (eg: 2)But when they meet, they will not instantly produce one baby.

Same thing with photons - they don't merge, but if you measure their waveforms they might appear to.At least that's how I understand things - IANAP.

Europeans seem to have bought into this precautionary principle twaddle where everything that cannot be proven to be safe must banned.

Of course that is utter rubbish, as there is no possible way to prove anything is safe. All this really means is that anything new is forbidden, a new form of Luddite-ism.

Anyway, if low frequency EM is to be banned in schools, why isn't it banned elsewhere too? After all if we are going to protect children from this danger we must do it correctly. Mobile phones and WiFi are u

I think this is more of a case of the mad burghers in Brussels effect, when a beaurocratic committee is set up it needs to justify its existence and makes continually more bizarre pronouncements to do that. They are usually reined in before they can do any damage, but I think a lot of the trust people have in the EU is getting more and more eroded.

Except, you know, this is not a report from the European Union, it is from a committee in the assembly of the Council of Europe, which is an entirely different institution. It does not even rise to the level of a resolution and in any case those resolutions are always non-binding, as far as I can remember.

I'll assume you're ignoring factual errors. But to get to the heart of things, this is not a "bizarre pronouncement". There's a bunch of confusing studies out there that were not well executed and seemed to show some evidence for cell phone radiation being harmful. The public at large is not very science-literate, nor are most politicians, so it was inevitable that this would lead to some of them playing better safe than sorry.

In this, they are responding to actual concerns from the public at large, however

I fail to see why K-12 students need cell phones or wireless networks to learn a damned thing.

Wired networks are a win from a management, reliability, latency and bandwidth perspective. Not being constantly distracted by stray text messages is something I would also check in the plus column.

There is at least some credible evidence cell radiation is harmful especially to children. Given wireless technology simply is not required in any shape or form to educate students what precisely is the downside? If t

There is zero chance. Theres so much electromagnetic radiation flinging through the air anyways, wifi isn't going to make the least bit of difference. If you really think wifi is a risk, then you need to keep your kid in a Faraday cage. Be warned though, I think they send you to jail for that.

There are millions of things around us that have not been proven to be safe. Can you prove that eating off china plates is safe? If we use 'has not been proved safe' as our criterion, we will be paralysed, unable to do anything.

It only makes sense to take a precautionary avoidance strategy if there is some evidence that harm could occur. Basically, you either need a plausible mechanism, or a plausible correlation between the potentially-harmful-thing and some form of harm. Leaded petrol and tobacco both hav

There is a proven possible danger from handsets. That is, there is a higher incidence of brain cancer in rats from massive exposures of mobile-band RF. And until we'll all been holding handsets to the side of our heads for 40 years that's about all the results we can reasonably expect from science.

But as any consideration of the inverse-square law taught in those schools' physics classes will show, exposure from laptops and access points is orders of magnitude less than handsets.

So why is this not widely known? Because people tend to not look beyond the headline spin, the parent post being a good example thereof. But also because industry-funded studies tend to generate biased results http://www.seattlemag.com/article/nerd-report/nerd-report [slashdot.org] which are then touted as "proof" that there is no ill effect.

..because kids are there to LEARN not to piss about on Facebook and their mobile phones.

Who gives a toss about the potential health issues, above is reason enough.

I'd even go a stage further and line all school buildings so they block all GSM & Wifi signals - make sure the school secretary & parents swap contact phone numbers in case of emergencies, problem solved.

But the schools shouldn't ban cell phones. They should install micro-cells that allow them to control what numbers are allowed to call in and out and when. For instance, anyone should be able to call 911, but do you really want people to be able to call the students other than the parents and fellow students?

But the schools shouldn't ban cell phones. They should install micro-cells that allow them to control what numbers are allowed to call in and out and when. For instance, anyone should be able to call 911, but do you really want people to be able to call the students other than the parents and fellow students?

Yes, obviously the right thing to do is condition our teenagers to believe that authority figures have absolute control over their ability to communicate.

Yes, obviously the right thing to do is condition our teenagers to believe that authority figures have absolute control over their ability to communicate.

Authority figures already have control, that's why they are called "authority figures" and not "random people off the street.".

Control how they communicate? From kindergarten, they are taught "Raise your hand if you want to ask a question." "Five pages double spaced for your report." "Typed, not handwritten". "Billy, stop passing notes to Susie." "Minus five points for the use of the word 'ain't'." "Minus two points for putting the period outside the quotation marks".

Yep. I love to get medieval on everyone's ass. A Trebuchet works nicely for that and of course my trusty sword helps get my point across to them idiots. Last but not least, there aren't any lawyers because "Might Makes Right" now back to work serfs